'Not even close' to reality: Trump bashed for 'schoolyard grudge match' with Comey

17 May

Donald Trump

Former FBI Director James Comey is facing a major accusation from President Donald Trump and his MAGA allies, including Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem and National Intelligence Director Tulsi Gabbard — who are claiming that Comey called for Trump's assignation. Gabbard told Fox News' Jesse Watters that Comey should be incarcerated.

On Instagram, Comey posted an image of seashells in sand that formed the numbers "86 47." The slang term "eighty-six" means "to eject," "to get rid of" or "to remove," and Trump is the 47th president of the United States.

Comey's defenders were quick to point out that the term doesn't necessarily have a violent connotation. In the restaurant business, for example, telling someone to "eighty-six" an order means canceling the order. Or a magazine editor might tell the staff to "eighty-six" an article, meaning that the article won't be published.

In a May 15 post on X, formerly Twitter, Noem wrote, "Disgraced former FBI Director James Comey just called for the assassination of @POTUS Trump. DHS and Secret Service is investigating this threat and will respond appropriately."

And Noem got a scathing response from former MSNBC host Keith Olbermann, who tweeted, "Listen, you lying witch, he didn't call for assassinating anyone. Since you murdered your daughter's dog maybe you ought to S--- about this."

Former federal prosecutor Joyce White Vance offered legal analysis of the Comey/"86 47" controversy during a Saturday afternoon, May 17 appearance on MSNBC. And she stressed that Comey's Instagram post doesn't even come close to being a prosecutable incitement to violence against the president.

When MSNBC host Alex Witt asked Vance if Comey is "perhaps being singled out for retribution" by the Trump Administration, she responded, "So look, this is a schoolyard grudge match. We all lived through the momentous occasion that led to Donald Trump firing Jim Comey as the director of the FBI. I don't think we need to rehash that personal relationship. The interesting legal question here is whether this qualifies as a threat, and the Supreme Court has actually spoken on this notion of what constitutes a criminally prosecutable threat. And this simply does not ring those bells."

Vance continued, "This is First Amendment-protected speech. I'm not defending it. It may have well been an exercise of bad judgment on Director Comey's part. But the reality is not all speech is the sort of speech that someone can be prosecuted, even for threatening a president with. And this is not even close. So, this is the sort of abuse of the criminal justice system that we're seeing this administration engage in at the same time, it claims that it's investigating weaponization of the criminal justice system by the prior administration."

Watch the full video below or at this link.

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